† If Looks Could Kill: CNN senior White House correspondent Ed Henry says he asked his now-famous follow-up question about the AIG bonuses because “[t]he president, like any good politician, decided to pick and choose what to answer. So he swatted away the budget question and ignored the AIG stuff.”

About Obama’s rejoinder to Henry that he needed time to get angry "because I like to know what I'm talking about before I speak," Boston Globe columnist Joan Vennochi retorts: “Being slow to anger is fine. Being slow to honesty is not.”

Indeed.  What Obama should have told Henry: “Because the TelePrompter script had not been written yet.”

Former Bush 43 speechwriter Michael Gerson thinks too much is being made of Obama’s inarticulateness (video link) when off script (meaning, no TelePrompter within eyeshot):

For politicians, the teleprompter has always been something of an embarrassing vice - the political equivalent of purchasing cigarettes, Haagen-Dazs and a Playboy at the convenience store.

This derision is based on the belief that the teleprompter exaggerates the gap between image and reality - that it involves a kind of deception. It is true that there is often a distinction between a president on and off his script. With a teleprompter, Obama can be ambitiously eloquent; without it, he tends to be soberly professorial. Ronald Reagan with a script was masterful; during news conferences he caused much wincing and cringing. It is the rare politician, such as Tony Blair, who speaks off the cuff in beautifully crafted paragraphs.

But it is a mistake to argue that the uncrafted is somehow more authentic.

The Stiletto disagrees. Obama needs a script even when he is purportedly “choked up with anger” – it’s as authentic as lip-syncing.

Take, by way of comparison, this passionate, extemporaneous (that is, without relying on a TelePrompter) three-minute speech by British MEP Daniel Hannan annihilating the

socialist economic policies of Prime Minister Gordon Brown in the European Parliament. This speech (transcript), "The Devalued Prime Minister Of A Devalued Government," will surely come to be regarded as one of the best political orations of all time, right up there with Patrick Henry's "Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death" speech:

† Your Bonus: $0. Continued Employment: Priceless.: On March 25^th Jake DeSantis, an executive vice president of the American International Group’s financial products unit, sent his letter of resignation to CEO Edward Liddy by way of The New York Times op-ed page. A few snippets:   

I was in no way involved in - or responsible for - the credit default swap transactions that have hamstrung A.I.G. Nor were more than a handful of the 400 current employees of A.I.G.-F.P. Most of those responsible have left the company and have conspicuously escaped the public outrage.

After 12 months of hard work dismantling the company - during which A.I.G. reassured us many times we would be rewarded in March 2009 - we in the financial products unit have been betrayed by A.I.G. and are being unfairly persecuted by elected officials. In response to this, I will now leave the company and donate my entire post-tax retention payment to those suffering from the global economic downturn. My intent is to keep none of the money myself.

I take this action after 11 years of dedicated, honorable service to A.I.G. I can no longer effectively perform my duties in this dysfunctional environment, nor am I being paid to do so. Like you, I was asked to work for an annual salary of $1, and I agreed out of a sense of duty to the company and to the public officials who have come to its aid. Having now been let down by both, I can no longer justify spending 10, 12, 14 hours a day away from my family for the benefit of those who have let me down. …

None of us should be cheated of our payments any more than a plumber should be cheated after he has fixed the pipes but a careless electrician causes a fire that burns down the house.

The next day NY writer John Kenney penned a humorous antithesis of the DeSantis manifesto in a Los Angeles Times op-ed. Here are snippets:

The fire was not my fault. And to my knowledge, it was never proved conclusively that the lighted cigarette and scented candles on my office desk were the cause.

Yes, I was asleep, but maybe let's try to look at the positive part of this and the fact that I was working late. Why my pants were off also remains a mystery. The fire marshal said that it was nothing short of a miracle that I wasn't killed, though he intimated in passing that the fact that I was profoundly drunk helped.

Why were pornographic websites up at the time I was found by rescue workers? This is a crucial question, and one my attorneys are looking into. I'm not remotely interested in man-on-camel Latvian porn (is anyone?) and don't know why it was bookmarked. …

The phony news release. This also remains a mystery to me and my legal team. How an e-mail was sent from my computer to major news organizations saying the firm was changing its name to Penis Bros. is deeply confusing and frankly repugnant to me. ...

Knowing that our firm has accepted government money, I would happily forgo receiving a bonus now to take part in the program to reroute bonuses to offshore accounts.

In spite of these curious setbacks, I believe my performance this year merits an exceptional review.

† Mirror, Mirror On The Wall: Who’s The Corruptest Of Them All?: The Chicago Tribune reports that the residents of LA are no longer shrugging off public corruption:

"We used to say that in Louisiana we like our food spicy and our politicians colorful," said Rafael Goyeneche, president of the Metropolitan Crime Commission, a corruption watchdog group. "But lately we have noticed a shift in the public's attitude toward corruption. It's no longer a spectator sport. People don't want to tolerate it anymore." …

Ranked according to corruption convictions per capita from 1998-2007, Louisiana is No. 3, well ahead of Illinois at No. 19. (Only Washington, D.C., and North Dakota ranked higher - and in North Dakota's case, the results were skewed because of its extremely small population.) …

Law-enforcement officials believe that the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, when 80 percent of New Orleans flooded after the city's crumbling levees failed, was a turning point. Residents and businesspeople returned to New Orleans determined to cleanse their hobbled city of the mildew of decades of public corruption. …

And in 2007, Louisiana voters elected Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal on a reformist anti-corruption platform - and Jindal promptly pushed through a package of legislative reforms including expanded whistle-blower protections, new limits on lobbyist gifts to lawmakers and prohibitions against state officials taking state contracts.

† Get With The Feelin' At The Car Wash – Yeah!: Jason Leroy Savage, 29, who was caught performing a sex act with a car wash vacuum last October was sentenced to 90 days in prison after pleading guilty to indecent exposure, and must also submit to drug testing, reports The Associated Press.

[Hat Tip: The Heel, an Ivy-educated attorney with a prestigious New York firm, and occasional contributor to this blog.]

† Updates To Previous Posts (third item, Look Before You Leap: Part II): As expected, KS Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D) signed a bill that requires abortion clinics to offer a client the chance to see ultrasound images of her unborn baby, and to listen to its heartbeat, before killing it. The legislation goes into effect July 1^st

Meanwhile, a jury in Topeka acquitted Dr. George Tiller of 19 criminal counts involving late-term abortions he performed in 2003, reports The Associated Press:

Prosecutors had alleged that Dr. George Tiller had in 2003 gotten second opinions from a doctor who was essentially an employee of his, not independent as state law requires, but a jury took only about an hour to find him not guilty of all 19 counts.

Tiller, who could have faced a year in jail for even one conviction, stared straight ahead as the verdicts were read, with one of his attorneys patting his shoulder after the decision on the final count was declared. …

Soon after the verdict was announced, the state's Board of Healing Arts made public a complaint against Tiller on allegations similar to those at issue in the criminal case. The complaint was filed in December but not released until Friday.

The board, which regulates doctors, could revoke, suspend or limit Tiller's medical license, or fine him. …

Tiller estimated that he performed 250 to 300 late-term abortions in 2003, each costing an average of $6,000.

† Updates To Previous Posts (last item, There's No Such Thing As Free Healthcare): The Wall Street Journal contends that it may be lucky for the rest of us that former Gov. Mitt Romney (R) concocted his "universal" health-care program “that the White House and Congress now want to inflict on the entire country”:

It is proving to be instructive, as Mr. Romney's foresight previews what President Obama, Max Baucus, Ted Kennedy and Pete Stark are cooking up for everyone else.

In Massachusetts's latest crisis, Governor Deval Patrick and his Democratic colleagues are starting to move down the path that government health plans always follow when spending collides with reality - i.e., price controls. As costs continue to rise, the inevitable results are coverage restrictions and waiting periods. It was only a matter of time.

They're trying to manage the huge costs of the subsidized middle-class insurance program that is gradually swallowing the state budget. … The state's overall costs on health programs have increased by 42% (!) since 2006. …

What really whipped along RomneyCare were claims that health care would be less expensive if everyone were covered. But reducing costs while increasing access are irreconcilable issues.

† Updates To Previous Posts (last item, Obama’s Family Values: Part V): Zeituni Onyango, President Barack Obama's illegal immigrant aunt from Kenya has again taken up residence in a Boston public housing project, reports The Boston Globe:

She was spotted at Obama's inaugural festivities in January and, according to neighbors, returned to Boston a few weeks ago for her third attempt to fight removal from the United States. She had been living in the country illegally since she was ordered deported in 2004. …

Critics, outraged that she is living in taxpayer-funded public housing while thousands of citizens and legal immigrants are on waiting lists, are scrutinizing the case for political favoritism. …

Onyango's fate will play out behind closed doors before Judge Leonard Shapiro in Boston. Onyango's lawyer, Margaret Wong of Ohio, successfully argued to reopen her case in December and have the proceedings closed to the public, according to the Executive Office for Immigration Review, which oversees immigration courts.

Meanwhile, another of Obama’s five Kenyan half brothers, Malik Obama, 51, was hospitalized after complaining of from stomach pain, and tested for cholera, reports The Associated Press.

Editorial Note: The "If Looks Could Kill" post was edited to tie the set-up and punchline of The Stiletto's TelePrompter joke more closely together, and the "Obama's Family Values" post was updated to add a contextual link.